State needs to make sure the park’s owner complies with the
fix-it orders and prosecute if the law is not complied with
Common sense says that if something looks like a duck and quacks like a duck, it’s a duck. When it comes to the eviction notice that Velladao Mobile Home Park resident Livia Alvarado received, if it looks like retribution and it quacks like retribution, well, you can guess the rest.
Alvarado was one of the residents who exposed horrific living conditions at the 25-trailer park at the corner of Luchessa Avenue and Monterey Road owned by Thomas Velladao. The mobile home park has been the site of chronic sewage spills, including a 700-square-foot spill in March that led to a final notice from the state for repairs, including large-scale problems with the park’s sewers, roads and lighting.
Alvarado was the only one of five residents with outstanding violations to receive an eviction notice.
If it looks like retribution and it quacks like retribution …
It’s pretty ironic to hear Velladao’s employee, park manager Robert Collins, pass judgment on Alvarado’s two damaged windows (“We sensed a desire to comply from other tenants. Space 21 [where Alvarado lives] had not intended to comply,” he told reporter Serdar Tumgoren.
Funny, we sensed that Velladao did not want to bring the trailer park up to habitable standards until residents like Alvarado brought the issues to the newspaper and brought pressure on the state to pay attention to the health and safety violations at the trailer park.
The law doesn’t address intentions or sensed intentions, it addresses violations.
Five residents’ trailers had violations, but only the resident whose had complained loudly about park violations received an eviction notice.
If it looks like retribution and it quacks like retribution …
One broken window and one warped window in Alvarado’s trailer earned her a 30-day eviction notice from Velladao.
“If I’m going to be hit with a potential jail sentence, a misdemeanor, all this stuff, you’d better get your window fixed,” Velladao said of the eviction notice he issued to Alvarado.
Two damaged windows pale in comparison with the major health and safety violations that the trailer park residents endured until Alvarado and others forced officials to enforce the law.
If it looks like retribution and it quacks like retribution …
When state inspectors return to Velladao Trailer Park to judge progress on correcting the many large-scale violations that could land Thomas Velladao in jail, we hope that they treat Velladao the same way he has treated his residents.
Progress is not good enough. Intentions are not good enough. If Velladao Trailer Park fails to meet any detail of any regulation listed in the state’s final compliance order, Velladao ought to be vigorously prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.
